As our instructor told us in that long-gone boxing ring, "We're teaching you this because, someday, you might have to fight a man that you're not authorized to kill."
Which, if nothing else, demonstrated that some of our instructors had a flair for exaggeration.
I didn't want to fightjulie, and I certainly wasn't going to climb up on the dock and try to slug it out. All I wanted was to get my bow line and the opportunity to run back to Dinkin's Bay. . . tail between my legs, if need be.
Behind Julie and friend, I could hear men asking, "What's going on? These guys giving you trouble?" Heard Julie say, "Couple smartass sport-fishermen. One just went for a swim."
He had an audience now, plus backup, so I didn't have much doubt about what he'd try to do. As I reached for the cleat, he lifted his left boot to stomp me—which I anticipated. I jumped to reach him, grabbed his right heel and pulled. Julie seemed to hang suspended in midair for a moment, then crashed spine-first onto the dock, both legs hanging over. I locked his knees under my arms and let my body weight—about 220 pounds—snatch him crotch-first into the cleat. A cleat is a mooring device with pronounced metal horns at each end, and both of those horns disappeared into Julie. He made a falsetto cry of shock, tried to sit up when I applied more pressure, then settled back, hollering for help.
To Julie's partner, I yelled, "Know what a wishbone is? Take one step toward this boat, your buddy better make a wish." I turned to Tomlinson. "Start the engine."
"You boys just hold 'er right there! You ain't goin' noplace!" A small man had pushed his way through the ring of fishermen, something in his hand. Without my glasses, I couldn't tell what. "Let go'a that man's legs or you'll wish you had. Don't be reaching for that line, neither!"
Tomlinson said very softly, "He's got a gun."
I released Julie and told Tomlinson, "Kill the engine."
I had my glasses on, trying my best to be conciliatory. The man's name was Futch, Arlis Futch—he told us that—and he was the founder, sole owner, operator, and the only one who much mattered around the docks of Sulphur Wells Fish Company. He told us that, too.
Judging from the way the fishermen deferred to him, I didn't doubt it.
"You boys get back to work. This ain't no dance. I need any help, you'll hear shots. By then I won't need no more help." He didn't laugh when he said it.
Futch had a body type that I had come to associate with the male descendants of Gulf Coast settlers: narrow shoulders, blunt fingers, bandy legs, but with hands and forearms large out of proportion, and trapezius muscles so pronounced that his head seemed to sit atop a pyramid. Also, he had the characteristic myopia. His eyes, magnified by thick glasses, were owl-sized.
"You hurt bad or just making noise?"
Julie had his arm over his partner's shoulder, sucking in air. "The sonuvabitch 'bout crippled me."
"He draw blood?"
"I'd rather bleed than have my nuts squished out my nose. That cleat liked to ruin me."
"Well, don't be feelin' your thingumabob around me, goddamn it! You want to inspect your personals, find a bush. Now somebody tell me what happened."
Julie still had enough wind to talk. "What happened was, these here two come in high and mighty thinkin' they could tie up. When I told 'em it was private they got smartmouthy, kind'a pushy. He tripped me, the big one, and I fell wrong or they wouldn't be here botherin' you now."
"That's how it happened, huh?"
"Ask J.D. Ain't that how it happened?"
J.D.: Julie's partner had a name.
Arlis Futch looked down at me, asked, "That the whole story?"
I said, "Not much that I recognize," but didn't offer any more.
"You gonna believe him? Shit." Julie was up pacing around now, kept glancing over, eager to take another shot at me, I could tell. "I was just tryin' to help, Mr. Futch. They come in here acting like big shots, what you want me to do?"
Futch had the shotgun tucked in the crook of his arm. Now he levered it open, looked as if to make sure it was loaded. "What I-want you to do is mind your own affairs. Someone wants a slip, they ask me, not you. That's just about exactly the way she goes round here."
"I didn't know you wanted flats boat business."
"Don't use that tone to me. What I want ain't none of your concern. You ain't from around here and you ain't no kin—"
"We been sellin' you fish for the last month, that's all—"
"And I paid you cash for 'em. Don't owe you diddly-squat. Don't even know your damn names and I don't want to know 'em. What I do know is, you and some of the others camped up the shore drink way too much whiskey, smoke your damn dope, and you're tryin' to get my local boys mixed up in matters they're damn near desperate enough to try. Somethin' else I know is, you're trouble. Just plain dog-mean trouble." Futch snapped the shotgun closed, but kept it pointed at the dock. I noticed just the wryest hint of a smile as he added, "So what you boys gonna do is jump in your skiff and disappear. Want to take a minute, hunt around the dock for any small things you lost, your thingumabob, whatever, that's fine. But don't come back."
"You sayin' you ain't buyin' no more fish from us?"
"You find someone else to haul it in, that's your business. Just don't let me catch the two of you on my property."
J.D., it turned out, was a talker too. He took turns with Julie hollering at Arlis Futch. They made obscene and impossible suggestions; they offered vague threats. Each was prefaced by "old man." Futch ignored them until he'd heard enough; then he looked at his watch before saying softly, "You boys want me to tell you when your time's up? Or should I jes' surprise you?"
Which sent the two of them walking toward their boat. When they were under way and out of the canal, Futch turned his attention to us. Because of the way he'd treated J.D. and Julie, I expected him to assume that we were the wronged parties and behave cordially. He didn't. He popped open the shotgun and shoved the shells into his pocket, saying, "What you waiting on? Get out. I don't want you around here neither."
Tomlinson said, "We need a spot to tie up," and told him who we were looking for and why.
Futch worked at appearing indifferent—he yawned a couple of times—but I could tell the story touched a chord. When Tomlinson had finished, he asked, "You was there when Jimmy Darroux burnt up? Maybe you're just sayin' that 'cause you're a cop or somethin.' "
Tomlinson said, "Do I look like a cop to you?"
"You look like just one more damn Yankee tourist to me."
"I was with him at the hospital. When he died. That's why we're looking for Hannah."
"Hannah, huh? Tell me somethin'—did he suffer real bad. At the end, I mean. Jimmy?"
"It didn't last long. If you were a friend of his, you can take comfort from that."
"I don't need no comfort, not from you I don't. Common sense gives me all the comfort I need." Judging from Futch's tone, his expression, I got the impression that he hoped Darroux had suffered, and was irritated that Tomlinson didn't offer more details.
"Jimmy Darroux made a request of me on his deathbed," Tomlinson said. "I'm determined to honor it."
Futch thought for a moment, stared along the dock where the commercial fishermen had returned to work but were still keeping an eye on us. "You looking for Hannah," he said finally, "that would be Jimmy's wife, Hannah Smith." In reply to my sharp look, Futch added, "I won't call her by her married name. She was always Hannah Smith to me, still is to this day."
"Do you know where we can find her? If she doesn't want to talk, considering what she's been through—-"
"Hannah ain't no prissy, mopey kind'a woman. She doesn't want to talk, she'll tell you plain enough. I ain't the one to make her decisions for her. She lives down the road a couple hundred yards, the yellow cabin up on the Indian mound." Futch pointed vaguely. "The cops've already talked to her, so if you're here to ask more questions she'll figure that out quick enough, too."
"So it's okay to tie up?"
"Didn't say that."
"Don't want your money. You boys just ain't clear about the way things stand, are you? You own this here boat?" He was talking to me. I nodded. "Let me explain the way it is. You paid more for this fancy boat then some a these men make in a year. Boat with a fancy platform over the motor so you can stand up there, dressed real nice, and look for fish when you got the time. Well, mister-man, those used to be our fish. Used to be our bay until the rich sports got their lawyers together and found a way to push us out.
"Time was I'd see only one or two of these here boats in a month. Helped 'em out many a time, too, tellin' where I saw the tar-pawn schoolin' or when the tripletail was around the traps. Tarpon and tripletail weren't nothin' to me, and it was the neighborly thing to do, I figured. Now'days, though, there're hundreds, hell, thousands'a these boats ever' where you look. Can't hardly strike a mess'a mullet without one'a these here flats boaters blastin' through givin' us their dirty looks." Futch hacked, spat, hacked, and spat again. "What you think it does to our boys, see a boat like yours? They got the whole world comin' down on their heads, sick kids, payments to make, banks yammering for their money and not a cent comin' in after the nets is banned in July. A lot of 'em didn't even finish high school, figuring they could always make a livin' fishin'. Now what they gonna do? You sports in the fancy boats got it all. You sports in the fancy boats took it all. Now you come in here lah-de-dah-de-dah askin' to tie up?" Futch had his face squinched into a thoughtful frown. "I reckon I jes' couldn't be responsible, you tie your boat here. One of the boys might mistake her for a two-holer and poot his mess on the deck. Or maybe worse. Lines might break and it'd drift off and catch fire, nobody's fault. My advice to you fellas is get the hell out an' don't come back. Hannah wants to talk to you, that's her business. But my docks ain't got no room for a boat like yours."
Chapter 4
Tomlinson seemed surprised when I beached my skiff in the mangroves south of the fish house so that we could look for Hannah Smith Darroux on foot. He'd been scolding me for skewering Julie on the cleat— "Violence is like a boomerang. It always comes back at you"—but he paused when I swung toward shore, favoring me with his you're -growing-as-a-human-being, expression—a look, happily, that I seldom receive. But I didn't beach my boat out of sympathy or to please Tomlinson. The way Arlis Futch had behaved interested me . . . interested and angered me both. I admired the fact that he empathized with the younger men, and he had summed up the inequities of the net ban accurately. Yet he also seemed to take perverse pleasure in being defiant and intractable. That kind of belligerence enjoys a mythos to which every region lays claim: the flinty Yankee, the bow-necked mid-westerner, the resolute cowboy. It is a character standard from folklore in which "good old common sense" is an essential bedrock ingredient. But too often, "common sense" is the safe harbor of ignorance and an excuse for intellectual laziness. They don't need the facts because they already know the truth—their common sense has spared them the effort of investigation or thought. It was precisely that attitude which too many cottage industry netters brought to the fishery, and, in doing so, they helped destroy their own way of life. Arlis Futch was an intelligent man. Stupid people don't build successful businesses or earn the respect of their peers. So why would he cloak himself in stupid indifference?
But that's not the only reason I swung into shore. The way Futch had reacted to Tomlinson's story piqued my interest. He had asked about Jimmy Darroux hoping to hear that the man had suffered. I was sure of that. It was in Futch's tone, his eyes. He hadn't approved of Darroux as a husband for Hannah Smith—a woman he spoke of with a degree of respect he certainly didn't show the men who worked around the docks. Tomlinson says my best quality and my worst quality are the same: an orderly mind. I think he's half right. Tomlinson is mystical, I am methodical. He believes in the Great Enigma, I do not. The behavior of any organism should be understandable once external influences are deciphered. When an otherwise predictable animal behaves oddly on the tidal flats—or on the docks—a little alarm goes off in my head. The inexplicable attracts me because there is nothing that cannot be explained. When the explanation is not readily apparent, I become compulsive about isolating the external influences. It attracts me in the same way that jigsaw puzzles and chess draw in similar types of people. Assemble enough pieces, make the right moves, and the reward is clarity.
The alarm had gone off when Arlis Futch asked about Jimmy Darroux, and when he spoke of the wife. Not a loud alarm, just a gentle chime of suspicion. But that, connected to the experience of holding a charred body in my arms, was enough. I wanted to meet Hannah Smith Darroux. I wanted to see for myself why Futch held her in such high regard.
I idled in close to shore, looking up at the lights ofhouses built on Indian shell mounds. When I judged we had gone a couple hundred yards, I tilted the engine and poled us toward a patch of mangroves. I didn't want to leave my skiff unattended in the open. There was no moon, but the night sky was star-bright, and Julie andJ.D. were out there cruising. I stern-anchored so that we could haul the boat off when we got back; then we waded through muck and oysters to the road that ribboned between the houses and the bay.
Tomlinson stood in the middle of the road, fingering a braid of his hair. There was no traffic. It was quiet but for crickets and the whine of mosquitoes. "I have a feeling it's that one. I don't know why, man, I just do." He was pointing to an old cottage with an open board porch. The porch light showed peeling, colorless paint. "I'll walk up and ask."
"No," I said, "we stay together. We'll start with the first house. If they don't know where Hannah Darroux lives, someone at the next house will."
But the elderly man in the first house knew. Turned out that Tomlinson had guessed correctly.
Hannah Smith Darroux was not the sun-wizened fishwife that I imagined she would be. She was like nothing I could have imagined—my imagination is not that fanciful. When Tomlinson knocked at the screen door, the floor of the porch on which we were standing began to vibrate with the weight of approaching fdotsteps; a steady, authoritative thud. I expected a man to answer. Instead, the door swung open and a woman confronted us, asking, "Help you?"
Tomlinson didn't speak for a moment, and then he said, "Huh?" as if he'd been dozing.
The woman said, "Huh what? Do I know you men?"
"We're . . . looking for Hannah Darroux."
"Pretty close, but what you found is Hannah Smith. What's your business?"
Tomlinson cleared his throat; he seemed to be having trouble speaking, but he was probably reacting to a kind of sensory overload. He had been as unprepared as I for the woman who stood in the doorway. Hannah Smith Darroux was well over six feet tall—probably six two, six three. Balanced on long crane legs, she had a busty, countrified body: big hands, shoulders, and bony bare feet. I guessed she would weigh 155, maybe 160. She wore jeans and a blue denim work shirt with the tail knotted and bloused loosely above skinny adolescent hips. I guessed her to be in her mid-twenties, maybe a shade older. Her hair was Navajo-black, the whole heavy gloss of it combed over onto her right shoulder as if she didn't want to be bothered with it. She wore no makeup, no jewelry of any kind—not even a wedding ring. The result was a kind of unconscious stylishness. She had wide, full lips, deep sun lines at the corners of her brows, good cheekbones, a squarish quarterback's jaw, and dark perceptive eyes that looked from Tomlinson to me, then back to Tomlinson, taking us in, assessing us, then dismissing us as unimportant. I saw no telltale redness in those eyes. The widow Darroux hadn't done much crying.
"I know this hasn't been the best of days, Mrs. Smith, but I'd like to speak with you. For just a few minutes."
"If I had a few minutes, I'd throw you in my dryer and close the door. You're drippin' all over my porch."
"Oh . . . well, see, I had a little. . . encounter down at the fish house—" Tomlinson was backing down the steps, trying to wring more water from his shirt.
"Arlis Futch throw you in, or just
have one of his boys do it?"
"Actually, I sort of fell—"
"Men that fall off docks ought to live in the mountains. If you're sellin' something, I suggest you try Denver. Wet the porches there."
"Seriously, I'm not selling anything, Mrs. Smith—"
"I should say you're not. Question is, why are you bothering me?"
Tomlinson opened his mouth as if to speak, then stopped to collect himself. By continually anticipating what he was going to say, then interrupting to reply to it, the woman was not only keeping Tomlinson off balance, she also was establishing a weird dominance that had even me wishing he would finally say something that would interest her.
After a second or two, he chose the direct approach. "I'm here because your late husband asked me to come. My friend pulled him out of the water this morning; I was at the hospital with him when he died. My name's Tomlinson, his name's Ford."
Which threw her off her rhythm. Caused her to narrow her focus, partly out of suspicion, I sensed. "Jimmy told you to come here?"
"Sit down, I'll tell you everything."
"Before he died, right? Not something crazy, like talking from the hereafter? You seem that kind to me."
"I am! You've got a good eye for people, Mrs. Smith. You want to give transsphere communications a try, we can discuss the possibilities later. For now, though, the only thing he ever said to me was while he was still alive. His last words."
"But the cops told me, this Lieutenant somebody, that Jimmy never regained consciousness. Now you're saying he spoke to you?"
"The police haven't interviewed me yet. I'll tell them, but I'd rather tell you first."
"I see." She pressed a long index finger to her lower lip, a reflective pose. "You could be cops just tryin' to trick me into something. The county cops or the A.T.F.—they already took up half my day. And me with mortuary arrangements, a million things to do. You try to trick me, I reckon my attorney would have to nail you to the wall. Or you could be reporters, same thing. They were nosing around here earlier."
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